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  <section id="a-brief-summary-of-leo">
<h1>A Brief Summary of Leo<a class="headerlink" href="#a-brief-summary-of-leo" title="Permalink to this heading">¶</a></h1>
<blockquote>
<div><p>“Word outlines are very useful. But Leo makes Word look like a clunky toy.”—Joe Orr</p>
</div></blockquote>
<p>Leo is a fundamentally different way of using and organizing data, programs and scripts. Leo has been under active development for 20+ years with an active <a class="reference external" href="https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/leo-editor">group of developers and users</a>.</p>
<p><strong>Leo is:</strong></p>
<ul class="simple">
<li><p>A fully-featured IDE, with many features inspired by <a class="reference external" href="https://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/">Emacs</a>.</p></li>
<li><p>An outliner. Everything in Leo is an outline.</p></li>
<li><p>A data manager, data manager and personal information manager.</p></li>
<li><p>A powerful scripting environment.</p></li>
<li><p>A tool for organizing and studying computer code.</p></li>
<li><p>Extensible via a simple plugin architecture.</p></li>
<li><p>A tool that plays well with  IPython, Vim and Emacs.</p></li>
<li><p>Written in 100% pure Python</p></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Leo’s unique features</strong></p>
<p>Leo <em>completely integrates</em> Python scripting and outlines. Simulating the following features in Vim, Emacs or Eclipse is possible, just as it is possible to simulate Python in assembly language…</p>
<ul class="simple">
<li><p>All commands and scripts have easy access to outline structure via a simple <a class="reference external" href="tutorial-scripting.html">Python API</a>. <br />
For example, p.b is the body text of the selected outline node. <br />
Scripts have full access to all of Leo’s sources.</p></li>
<li><p><a class="reference external" href="tutorial-pim.html">Clones</a> create multiple views of an outline.  <br />
Leo’s underlying data is a <a class="reference external" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Directed_acyclic_graph">Directed Acyclic Graphs</a>.  <br />
As a result, Leo organizes data in completely new ways.</p></li>
<li><p>Leo’s <a class="reference external" href="html/commands.html#clone-find-commands">clone find commands</a> enable the <a class="reference external" href="appendices.html#the-leonine-way-to-refactor-code">Leonine way to refactor programs</a>.</p></li>
<li><p>Scripts and programs can be composed from outlines using <a class="reference external" href="tutorial-basics.html#markup">outline-oriented directives</a>.</p></li>
<li><p>Importers convert flat text into outlines.</p></li>
<li><p>&#64;button scripts apply scripts to outline data.</p></li>
</ul>
<p>These features combine to create a <a class="reference external" href="leonine-world.html">Leonine</a> way of programming and
organizing. You won’t learn all about Leo in a day or two. <a class="reference external" href="tutorial.html">Leo’s
tutorial</a> explains the basic features. You can learn more advanced
features later. Please <a class="reference external" href="https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/leo-editor">ask for help</a> immediately if you get stuck.</p>
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